Ballet with a twist

This week Leipziger Ballet troupe will perform at Warsaw's Teatr Wielki, in the Polish National Opera. On Tuesday, February 20, the group will perform The Creation by Joseph Haydn, and the next day they will present a ballet performance to the music of Rachmaninoff and Schubert.

The history of the group known as the Leipziger Ballet started in 1991. Then Uwe Scholz, who at the age of 26 had taken over leadership of a ballet troupe in Zürich and headed it very successfully for six years, began preparing performances for a group of Leipzig dancers. His first work was The Creation, based on Haydn's piece of the same name. From that moment until his death in 2004, Scholz prepared many performances for the Leipziger Ballet  - not only to music originally designed for ballet but also to symphonic, sacral and even modern music. 

Many of Scholz's interpretations have entered the repertoires of other ballet groups all over the word. The secret of Scholtz's success lay in his attitude toward music. "Music played a major role in Uwe's life. Listening to music with him remains an unforgettable experience," said Emmanuéle Ruegger, a friend of Scholz.

Today the Leipziger Ballet is a group of 40 dancers from about 20 countries who dance in the neoclassical ballet style. The group is very well known not only in Germany, where it is considered one of the country's most important ballet groups, but also around the world. It has performed in such countries as the US, Portugal, Japan and France.